


The Floor is Lava

by Mangusti



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man - All Media Types, Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017)
Genre: Ceilings, Crack Treated Seriously, Gen, Identity Reveal, Ned Leeds is a Good Bro, Peter panics
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-06
Updated: 2019-04-18
Packaged: 2019-11-12 11:41:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,077
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18010283
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mangusti/pseuds/Mangusti
Summary: When Peter forgets that walking on the ceiling isn't normal for anyone else other than him.





	1. I lava ceilings

**Author's Note:**

> This was supposed to be funny. Why am I not funny when I want to be?

It had been a long night for one Peter Parker. Patrolling almost the whole night hadn’t been his original plan but there had been so much stuff happening from stolen cars to helping find a missing cat. The cat had been absolutely adorable with its big sparkling eyes and by the time he had arrived home, the sun was rising over the horizon and the flecks of light hurt his sensitive eyes. He slept for an hour before his obnoxious alarm clock decided it was the perfect time to wake up and start the new day. Groggily, he shut down the clock carefully (he had already broken one by smashing it to pieces and _boy_ had that been hard to explain to Aunt May).

Deciding to risk it, he shut his eyes again to fall into a dreamless slumber.

It was Aunt May who woke him up from it, frantically speaking about how he could still make it if he ran and dressed up quickly.

He muttered back something unintelligible in his sleep deprived state and put some clothes on, still half asleep.

He did make it in time thanks to his web shooters. He had swung to school purely by instinct since his eyes had a hard time trying to stay open. At one point he had considered skipping school altogether and sleeping on a rooftop or something.

He felt like _death_ , like a zombie trying to look like a normal, breathing, human. Peter could _feel_ the dark eye bags under his eyes. Comping his tousled hair with his fingers didn’t help and he still looked like he had slept the last night under a bridge. He sure as hell felt like it.

The front of the school yard was full of people walking like they were woken from their hundred year long sleep this morning and had a hard time dragging themselves into the building. Peter blended in the mass and let it guide him inside. He didn’t see Ned anywhere, so he went straight to where his locker was to get his books for the day.

When he was getting his books from his locker, it happened. There was a noisy group of people a few meters away from him, talking and chattering (why do girls always laugh so loudly?). Out of nowhere, someone of them shouted.

“The floor is lava!”

And that’s how Peter ended up on the ceiling.

In his defense, supervillains were starting to be an ordinary thing, and no one even batted an eye when one appeared. They just run away screaming because, well, that’s what people normally do. But at least they clear off the area which is a good thing. Although oftentimes people had a bad habit of staying on the sidelines and watching the battle unfold like they weren’t in imminent danger.

Therefore, it would be completely normal and plausible if there was actual lava on the school grounds. His sleepy mind had come to the clever conclusion that getting as far away as you can from the lava is important because it’s highly dangerous and could kill him instantly. So ceiling it was.

Wait... ceiling?

Peter was now completely aware of all the stares he was getting from his schoolmates. There was no screaming, no panic. Only a pregnant silence, waiting to be broken by the first person who dared to say something.

No wonder his spider sense hadn’t gone off. The danger was nonexistent.

But his identity was in jeopardy. No normal person is able to stick to the ceiling and stay there. He had never been as awake as he was right now, eyes as big as saucers.

The full realization of his unfortunate situation hadn’t completely registered in his brain yet. Yet. The panic would soon come, he just knew it. This time it was his and not some civilians’ who are running for their lives.

He couldn’t handle the heavy silence anymore.

“Wassup? Lovely day today, isn’t it?” he blurted, not having any control of his own mouth. That happened awfully often.

It took five seconds after that.

Suddenly he was way too aware of the loud pulse in his ears, thumping like the end of the world would be coming. Maybe it was. For him. He could feel his face warming up and his hands becoming sweatier by the seconds as they pressed against the goddamn ceiling.

How do people breathe again? You inhale the air slowly and then blow it out, right? He was failing the first step.

It felt like hours, but it must have been only a few minutes when he heard the sharp intake of breath. “Dude.” Peter knew that voice. It was Ned who had probably just entered the hall.

He could feel the incoming headache but was too afraid to move. His unseeing eyes and panicked expression told everything to his best friend.

“Parker, what the f–”

 _Oh god_ , _Flash was behind him!_

“Oh my god! Mr. Stark’s newest, uh, invention is so cool! You told me about it yesterday and how it, um, let’s the user walk on walls like a spi– like an insect!” Ned wasn’t the best liar in the world and his stuttering wasn’t exactly convincing, but Peter was grateful for the distraction.

He tried to say something but soon discovered he couldn’t form the words and ended up looking like a fish out of water, mouth opening and closing uselessly.

Of course, it was Flash who replied back. “So, does Spider-Man use that invention too?”

Why did he have to mention Spider-Man? People were smart in this school and he could picture the gears turning in everyone’s heads.

Ned scratched his chin awkwardly and answered, “Uh no… He can stick to surfaces naturally.”

Peter truly hoped everyone thought he was such a pathetic person that he could never be secretly a superhero. Or maybe he was pathetic enough to be a superhero sporting a bright red and blue skin-tight suit almost every day. But the suit was really cool and latest technology and he really wished he was wearing it at the moment.

“But Peter’s wearing an invention! They – Mr. Stark and Peter – uh… invented it together! They used Spider-Man as an inspiration!”

Peter really _really_ appreciated his best friend’s attempt to fix the situation, but this nightmare would never be over until Peter was back to the ground.

But it was like his body was on a complete lockdown, limbs rigid and unresponsive, still glued to the ceiling. Unconsciously, he was clinging to the hard surface for dear life to stay away from everyone. To be as far away from the stares and whispers as he could. No one could get him from here, yet he didn’t feel safe.

“Peter, you need to calm down,” he heard Ned saying below him, worry coating his voice. “Here. I’ll help you down.”

Peter turned his head to see Ned offering his slightly shaking hand to him. It was within his reach and he could grab it if he just unstuck his right hand fingers. There was a smile on his friend’s face, albeit a small one, as he waited as patiently as he could in a situation like this.

Deep breaths, Peter. Deep breaths.

One finger was off, another one following soon. The three others he yanked off with force.

With his now free hand, he reached for Ned’s hand warily – the mental image of that one painting crossed his mind and he smiled back at Ned.

Ned’s hand was bigger than his and enveloped his smaller one. It was warm and calming. The encouraging look his friend gave him made him compose himself, the staring students forgotten.

When he finally got his body to work, he jumped down with Ned’s help, knees almost buckling under him. There were several possible reasons for his trembling.

A shaky ‘damn’ was all Peter managed to mutter.

And then all hell broke loose.

Of course, no one was going to forget about a person being on the ceiling the moment the said person returned to the same level with them.

Peter swallowed down the lump in his throat and forced his legs to stop shaking as he tried to ignore the frantic whispers and questions around him. This wasn’t the end of the world and everything would be fine eventually like in comic books, right? No one would remember his little mishap tomorrow; the nerd Peter Parker isn’t very memorable after all.

Peter wiped his sweaty palms on his jeans, hoping that the floor could swallow him.

The school bell rang – resonating in the hall and making Peter’s ears ache – but no one made a move to go to their first class of the day. Instead they all stood around him and gawped at him like he had grown a second head or two extra pairs of hands.

And then his savior came.

“What’s with all this fuss?” a female teacher, whose class Peter had never had, asked. She made a waving motion with her hands, signaling them to get going.

Everyone was glancing behind them as they walked away. Flash still stood where he had been the whole time, glaring daggers at Peter. “Pen- Parker was on the ceiling!”

The teacher rolled her eyes and laughed, shaking her head in disbelief. “Right. Get to your class. Chop chop.” Flash obeyed reluctantly.

She then turned to face Peter, looking stern with her hands on her hips. “You’re Parker, correct?”

Peter couldn’t trust his mouth yet, so he only nodded as an answer.

Before she could start questioning them Ned grabbed his arm and began dragging him past the teacher and towards their first class. “Gotta go. We’re late. Uh- bye!”

Their escape came to a halt when they rounded the corner and Ned grabbed both of Peter’s shoulders, brows knitted in worry. “You okay?”

“Y-yeah.”

“Are you going home?”

Peters eyes widened at his friend’s question.

“I can’t. What would May say if I suddenly came back home?” He turned around to walk past Ned who was blocking his way to the classroom. “Let’s just go. We’re lucky if the teacher hasn’t come yet.”

“You could always say you were feeling sick,” Ned reasoned.

“I don’t want to worry her.”

In Ned’s opinion Peter was way too stubborn for his own good sometimes, but he shrugged and jogged back to his best friend’s side. “So how did you even end up in that situation?”

“I’ve never been as tired as I am right now.” They both knew that was a blatant lie. “And then someone behind me yelled ‘the floor is lava’. Superhero instincts, I guess,” Peter shrugged.

“Oh man...”

“Can we just not talk about this, please?”

“Yeah, yeah sure.”

The silence did last only until they got to the classroom and Ned started gushing like the typical fanboy he was. “You’d totally ace that game, dude!”

“Wake me up if I start snoring,” Peter muttered, his voice muffled as he rested his head on his hands. He could sleep the physics class if he was lucky and the teacher didn’t mind. He already knew the things they were going to learn today like the back of his hand.

Ned didn’t wake him until the end of the class when everyone else were packing their stuff and heading to their next lesson. Peter rubbed his stiff neck, groaning.

“Better?” Ned asked.

“No.”

He slept for another hour and missed a boring English class.

 

* * *

 

 By lunch time, there was already a rumor going on around the school about him being a mutant. Students who had never paid any kind of attention to him before where now staring at his every move when he walked on the halls like they were expecting him to do something supernatural all of a sudden.

Peter sat at the table farthest from the other students and nibbled at the stuff on his plate that the cook had the audacity to call ‘food’. Nevertheless, Ned was wolfing down his own share.

“Not hungry?” he asked between forkfuls.

“Not really, no.”

“It’s actually tolerable if you ignore the look and texture.”

A chair next to Peter was then pulled out and someone laid their tray on the table rather harshly. The newcomer glanced at her plate briefly, raised one elegant eyebrow and dug her sketchbook from her bag. Only after that did she regard them.

“How’s it going, bug boy? You look like you could use some sleep,” Michelle said, drawing his face on her book.

“You heard about,” Peter gulped, “morning?”

“Nah. I knew already.” Not even looking up, Michelle continued finishing her sketch of Peter’s baffled expression. From what he could see, it looked pretty good.

The silence continued for a few moments until something unexpected happened.

“It’ll be okay,” she said, the corners of her mouth turned slightly upwards. It was a genuine smile, something Peter rarely – if ever – saw from her. She looked really pretty like that.

“Uh- thanks,” he stammered and tried to smile back.

“I’m here too,” Ned reminded them helpfully. “But seriously you’ve done weirder. This is small.”

Michelle practically showed her sketchbook in Peter’s face who in response gave her a thumbs up.

“You guys are losers, remember that. You’ll be losers tomorrow and the week after, so you have nothing to worry about,” she assured.

Ned cocked his head to the side. “But you figured it out, didn’t you?”

“Because I’m me,” she smirked, crossing her arms. “Hey, don’t drool on my book,” she suddenly said as she turned towards Peter. The boy was fast asleep on the table using Michelle’s sketchbook as a pillow and snoring quietly.

Ned snorted while Michelle commented on how cute Peter looked and yanked her book back.

“Wha–” Peter yawned and rubbed his tired eyes. It took him a while to register that they were in the cafeteria and it was only afternoon.

The school day would be over in a few hours and he could finally go straight to home – no Spider-Man, just sleep.


	2. A Sticky Situation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> How many spiders does it take to change a light bulb? One. And how many chairs does that spider need? Zero.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Peter's not the only one who needs sleep. My self-criticism is at its lowest after midnight and I can get something in the Word document for once.  
> Also, this has been almost ready for a while. I'm just the laziest person I know.

Having superpowers was cool and all but he was still human and needed to do basic human stuff to function properly, one of those being sleeping. He actually suspected that he needed a lot more sleep than most teenage boys but had decided to push that thought aside to convince himself and everyone around him that yes, he was, in fact, okay, and yes, he had gone early to bed and slept full eight hours. And no, he wasn’t avoiding sleeping because of some stupid fears he had.

He was getting better with falling asleep and didn’t wake as many times breathing heavily during the night as a few months prior. The last week had just been so hectic; he webbed one bad guy, and another came right around the corner, figuratively and for real. Thieves and burglars had something against him, he was sure. Why couldn’t the criminals sleep for one night?

But he loved his job, this vigilante thing he had. He could help the people who needed it, look for the little guy. Peter could risk some of his good night’s sleep so someone else could sleep safely through the night and not worry about alien weapons or the fate of their missing cat.

Unfortunately, today he had faced the consequences of not fulfilling his body’s needs and paid the price. He could only blame himself. This was way more serious than forgetting – or simply not having time – to eat breakfast and have your stomach growl during a quiet time in your lesson. No one starts to spread rumors about that. Besides, it’s only embarrassing for a while and then you forget about it.

Legs turning to jelly, Peter dragged his feet forward and was grateful he hadn’t nodded off yet on his way home from school. It had been only a little over two o’clock the last time he had checked his phone, so May wouldn’t be home for hours. He was going to nap undisturbed in his bunk bed and pretend everything was alright when May would be home.

There was no one in front of their apartment door waiting for him, ready to detain him for being a dangerous mutant or wanting Spider-Man’s autography, so that was a good thing (he was kind of ashamed to admit that someone trying to arrest him had been one of the first things he had dreaded after getting down from the ceiling). After opening and closing the door too loudly, causing the slam to reverberate in the hall, he threw his backpack on the floor and collapsed on his soft and comfortable bed face first. The nice lady from downstairs was making spaghetti, he could smell it.

At first it had been weird, to sense what was happening in other apartments close to theirs, yet now it was almost soothing to hear the sounds of living and know everything was fine. The smell of homemade cooking and their neighbor’s cat purring lulled him to much needed sleep.

By the time Peter woke up, it had already gotten dark – or as dark it could get in a big city. May still wasn’t home and he was getting considerably hungry, so he padded to the kitchen, still rubbing the sleep from his eyes. Pondering over wanting a sandwich or just an apple he switched the lights on in the kitchen. The room was luminous for about two second before a noticeable popping sound could be heard. Their only two years old light bulb had burned out.

Peter ran his hand through his messed-up hair, frustrated. If May was going to cook them something after she came from work, she needed to see in the kitchen for that or the outcome would be even more horrible than usually. He switched the light on in the living room to see better and went to rummage around a cabinet to see if they had new light bulbs.

There was a package of them on the top shelf and Peter grinned when it wasn’t empty as was often the case.

How many spiders does it take to change a light bulb? One. And how many chairs does that spider need? Zero.

He jumped easily to the ceiling, attaching his feet and left hand firmly to the surface and cursed the inventor of popcorn ceilings. The light was almost out of its socket when he felt a sharp pain in his hand and quickly pulled it away.

Peter realized a moment too late that he had forgotten to switch the light off.

“Ow!” he cried, almost dropping the old light bulb but catching it thanks to his quick reflexes. Electric shock. Great. Because of the painful interruption, he failed to notice the slight tingle at the back of his head trying to warn him of what was about to happen.

Their front door opened, revealing Aunt May in the doorway with shopping bags hanging from both of her arms. “Peter? Are you okay? I heard something-” May called for him with a worrying tone in her voice, looking around the dark apartment.

Peter stiffened. It was happening again. He should never touch a ceiling again in his life. Mind racing, he formed a quick escape plan. If he backed away slowly, May wouldn’t notice him, and he could go back to his room and pretend he had been sleeping.

May squinted at the kitchen, possibly wondering why her nephew wasn’t answering. Peter couldn’t move backwards, or he would be in her line of sight, so he was laying flat against the prickly surface, hoping that she wouldn’t look up. Which she just did. Her eyes met his big, terrified ones. This whole thing felt like a horror movie except he was the horrifying creature crawling on the ceiling towards its unfortunate victim. Now he felt bad and really sorry for Aunt May.

May dropped the groceries she had been carrying on the floor, slack-jawed. She screamed as Peter jumped out of the ceiling with a backflip before she could find herself a broom.

“Please don’t be mad!” Peter pleaded. She blinked a few times like she was finally distinguishing her nephew’s nervous features in the dark. “Peter…” May said with a weak voice like she couldn’t believe her own eyes.

“I- I can explain!” Peter stuttered, waving the old light bulb that was still in his hands.

May was breathing heavily with a hand over her heart. “Just let me calm my racing heart… I mean- what the fuck?” May exclaimed. She seemed to still be trying to wrap her head around what had happened during the last few minutes.

“You’re dreaming!” Peter wanted to congratulate himself for the greatest lie ever and throw himself a party because he was grounded until thirty.

“I wish.”

They were both shaking, his expression likely mirroring May’s, neither of them knowing what to do or how to proceed.

What had Ned’s excuse been when Peter had screwed up earlier today? Before he could try his luck at lying convincingly to the person who knew him best (until recently), May adjusted her glasses and began speaking.

“I got a call from your school at work. Said they were worried about you. Apparently, some rumors of you being a mutant were being spread and they wanted to know if they had any truth in them,” she said, rubbing her temples.

“I had no idea what they were talking about. You had created a crowd around you in the morning before the first class and some student had claimed that you had been on the ceiling. Another student had confirmed that and added that some Asian boy, Ned I assume, said you were using Stark technology. I thought you were bullied. Then I come home to this,” she cried and gestured at Peter. “Please tell me what’s going on.”

Like a cornered animal, he set the burned-out light bulb on the kitchen counter, gulping. This day couldn’t be real. He should have never woken up this morning.

“The light burned out,” he blurted.

“At school?”

“Um no. Here- In the kitchen. I was… changing it.”

She raked her hands through her hair. “That doesn’t explain anything.”

May wouldn’t notice, would she? He rolled up his sleeves which revealed his web-shooters strapped to his wrists. “With these I can defy gravity,” he lied, hoping that May wouldn’t question it. That sentence had sounded way too practiced even to his own ears.

She raised her eyebrows in disbelief and shook her head. “The world has become a weird place. How does that even work?”

“Oh!” Peter started fumbling with the web-shooters, careful to not actually press the button he knew would release the web. “You have to um… press this and it’ll make your palm… sticky.” Peter saw May scrunch up her nose.

“Mine are still… sticky, so I can show you!” More like sweaty. This was one of the reasons why he hadn’t told May about his extracurricular activity. She had already enough on her plate and she already looked alarmed because of his ‘Stark tech’.

May’s gaze wandered to his hands and then to the ceiling and finally to his eyes. She was still horrified. “Is it safe?”

“Totally! Mr. Stark designed them!” In reality it was originally Peter and Mr. Stark made some upgrades to them.

Finally realizing to switch the power off, Peter stuck to the ceiling (that still felt annoying under his fingertips) and simply put the light bulb in its appropriate place. And somehow something so simple had compromised this whole ‘secret identity’ thing he had.

The whole time May stood under him with her back rigid and arms open, ready to catch him if he fell. “Well, this would come in handy in the future,” she stated in a daze when Peter returned to be a normal person and not a party trick.

“Yeah. It would.” Especially when you swing around Queens and its buildings trying to catch criminals in nothing but spandex. Come to think of it, if Captain America was after petty criminals, would he use a taxi? Or would he drive a car or a motorcycle after all? Maybe run really fast?

May turned the newly changed light on and began gathering the groceries that had scattered around when she dropped her bags. Peter came to help her put the food and other stuff in their right places. May turned to face him, a milk carton in her hand. “You don’t talk much about your internship,” she began. “What is it like? What do you do? Do you like it?” she asked. “You’re usually so talkative.”

“The internship? Right! It’s fun.”

May deserved nothing but the truth but was Peter himself ready? He had already had a horrible day and a horrified and stressed aunt possibly yelling at Mr. Stark over the phone wasn’t going to make it any better.

May smiled at him challengingly, her other hand on her cocked hip. “Fun, you say? What do you usually do?”

He was nodding a bit too much. “Yeah! It’s amazing! I get to uhh… help Mr. Stark in his workshop.”

Helping with his Spider-Man suit was something he had actually done a few times, but he was sure real interns didn’t do that.

“That’s amazing, honey,” May said with a proud smile.

“Yeah…” The yogurt in his hand seemed suddenly more interesting than it had a been a second ago.

“But I don’t want you using potentially dangerous technology from Stark however you like, okay?” she said, gesturing vaguely at his arms.

“Today at school was an accident. I’m sorry. It won’t happen again.”

“It’s okay. Come here. You seem to need a hug.”

 

* * *

 

Waking up as feeling well-rested and not like wanting to smack his Avengers pillow over his head and hide in a cocoon from the world was new. When he got to the breakfast table for the first time in weeks, May didn’t hide her surprise. She folded her arms on the table over the newspaper she had been reading and smiled at him fondly. “When was the last time you ate breakfast at a table on a weekday, Mister Sleepyhead?”

“Don’t remember,” Peter said while making himself a toast.

“Jam’s not breakfast, honey.”

“It is now.” He bit into the sugary heaven that was his crisp bread. May shook her head.

Plopping down next to May at the table, licking his fingers, his gaze landed on the colorful picture in one of the newspaper’s pages. He bent forward to see more clearly. There was a picture of him – of Spider-Man – picking up a cat from a tree. Peter knew the article was making fun of him as a superhero, but he couldn’t find it in himself to care when he knew the Avengers (or what was left of them) personally and had even managed to snatch _the_ Captain America’s shield.

Besides, cats needed a hero too, someone to pick them up when in distress.

When he raised his gaze from the picture to get himself a glass of water, May was looking at him curiously, brows furrowed, and mouth set in a hard line, mind somewhere far away.

“Something wrong?” he asked, concerned.

She seemed to snap out of whatever it had been. “No, no, just thinking.”

“About what?”

“That article about Spider-Man. Must be hard,” she said.

“To save cats?”

“To be a superhero.”

“Mm, I guess. They have a lot of responsibilities, the lives and trust of innocent civilians on their shoulders.” Leaning against the table, he gulped down the fresh, cold water and grinned. “But they’re cool!”

It was May’s turn to hum in affirmation. Just as she opened her mouth to say something, probably to praise Thor’s quite admirable muscles, Peter realized to glance at the clock. He dashed hastily to find his shoes. “Sorry! Gotta go!”

He finished tying the shoelaces of his sneakers in record time and was almost out the door. “Bye, May!”

“Have a nice day at school!”

That’s what he hoped, too.

School proved to be a nasty reality check for him. Students were openly pointing fingers at him, whispering their friends about the rumors that had no doubt escalated and spiraled out of control. He suppressed a groan.

No one had even believed his fake internship, so how could they swallow something unheard-of like Stark tech that could let its user walk on ceilings.

He maneuvered through the masses, apologizing to every other person, to get to his locker and to Ned, who smiled widely when he spotted Peter. Michelle was already keeping company for Ned, nose in her book.

“Look!” he exclaimed, shoving his phone to Peter’s face.

“I can’t see, Ned, it’s too close!”

“Sorry but look!” The live footage playing on Ned’s phone was clearly making his best friend excited. “There’s a dragon! A real dragon!”

Peter was sure his enhanced hearing picked out a soft snort from Michelle’s direction. “What, seriously?” He leaned closer to Ned, so they could both watch. There was truly a huge, scaly dragon with wings and all freaking havoc in the Times Square. It was even breathing fire and setting the streets on fire. Did- did Iron Man just get literally roasted?

As the smoke abated, the armored suit was still intact and flying. Peter let out an audible sigh in relief. He knew the suit was fireproof, but one could never be sure when fighting a dragon straight from a fairytale.

Vision’s light beams from the odd stone in his forehead only pushed the beast back and made it roar, its rage fueled the flames to be bigger than before.

Almost like sensing his resolve, Michelle looked up from whatever book she was currently reading and gave him her no-nonsense glare. “You’re not really planning to go, are you?” Michelle asked.

“But I could help them!”

“Could you really?”

“Yes! At least I think so,” Peter faltered.

Ned grimaced as a loud explosion could be heard from the phone speaker.

“Peter went to the school infirmary because of a bad stomach ache, right, Ned?” A small smirk played on her lips.

Ned nodded enthusiastically. “Yeah! It’s so bad that–”

“Go get it, bug boy,” Michelle interrupted, gave him a thumb up and got back to reading her book.

“Bye, guys!” Peter yelled as he sprinted to the other direction where he knew the backdoor was. His suit was always in his backpack for situations like this.

 

* * *

 

Spider-Man was at Times Square in thirty minutes. It was a lot longer than what he would have liked but what can you do when the distances are great. An ear-piercing cry could be heard before a building was set on fire, so he knew the dragon was still roaming around.

For once people had been smart and fled from the scene. The whole place looked like a living hell with its ashen streets and burned cars. There didn’t seem to be any victims, the whole place void of humans except for him, Mr. Stark and Vision. Even reporters had decided to not risk being fried, only a helicopter flew above them.

What had once been a lively and busy street was now a big burned stage for a battle about to happen. The emptiness was eerie.

He shot a web to get closer and perched on top of a streetlight, that was still miraculously upright, to examine the situation.

The dragon looked nothing like Smaug, but it was at least more real than special effects and computer animation. Awesome! He was living every little boy’s dream minus New York getting destroyed. 

Come to think of it, he was living his _own_ dream of seeing a fantasy creature in real life.

But fanboying could wait when the city was in danger.

Iron Man was firing purposefully his repulsors at the beast’s eyes, causing it to moan and whimper under the suit’s steely gaze. The dragon coughed a thick, gray puff of smoke out of its nostrils like it was running out of flames.

The dragon proved to be more than just living a flamethrower. Giant jaws opened revealing a set of piercing teeth ready to bite into anything that might get too close.

This was his moment. Peter shot web after web first to get closer and then to glue those horrible jaws together, so he wouldn’t have to look at its contents ever again.

The dragon lunged its head forward to snag Iron Man out of air and into its unforgiving stomach but found its mouth sealed shut.

“Hey, hothead, why don’t you pick on someone your own temperature?” Peter joked from the dragon’s field of vision, the creature’s eyes shifting at his figure sitting on some building’s outer wall. He had no idea how intelligent this creature was and if it could understand them at all. Was it another scientist turned into a monster, an alien maybe? Or did someone cast a spell on their storybook, thus making the characters come to life? But where were the knights with their noble horses?

There were suddenly sparks coming out of its nose.

“No, no, don’t fire at me! I’m way too cool for you!” A lie. A dragon would always win over a teenage boy in colorful spandex when it comes to coolness.

It stared right at him with its big, black eyes almost like it had understood and was now regretting giving any attention to Spider-Man.

Iron Man deemed it safe to get closer to them and flew next to him, keeping watch on the dragon the whole time. The faceplate lifted up, revealing Mr. Stark’s unreadable expression.

“Kid! What are you doing here?” Peter could hear the unsaid _you should be in school._

“You seemed to need help.”

“We’re a little low on staff but we were managing!”

The mask concealed his raised eyebrow, but he hoped the moving eye lenses would get the point across.

“S.H.I.E.L.D. will come as backup in a moment.”

“I’m backup!”

Peter knew that expression. It was the look Mr. Stark gave him every time Peter did or said something incredibly stupid. Peter called it The Dad Look™ which, of course, he hadn’t told anyone about. That look also gave him the permission to be an annoying and whining teenager.

“I’m already here so I could wrap the dragon in a nice packet for S.H.I.E.L.D. to pick up. Alive.”

The soon-to-be-a-present had had enough of watching two humans bicker at each other and decided that now was the perfect time for a barbecue.

Feeling chills creeping up his spine, Peter ducked them both out of the way just before scalding hot air from the dragon’s nostrils would have grilled them. Or at least Peter.

And like the cool and weird android toaster he was, Vision phased straight through the confused dragon. Could Vision, like, make it explode from the inside? That giant dude from Germany might be able to do it by shrinking and growing. Wait. That’s disgusting. _Focus, Peter! Don’t think about blood and guts!_

“It appears to have unnaturally thick skin capable of preventing my energy blasts. Spider-Man’s webs could possibly restrain its movements,” Vision said in his calm and collected tone.

“Fine,” Mr. Stark said but made sure to sound as reluctant and bitter as humanly possible. “Wrap that ugly lizard up, kid.”

Peter nodded, grinning excitedly under his mask. “Distract it by blasting at its eyes and I’ll start shooting my webs at its legs!” he yelled when he jumped from the wall, freefalling for a few seconds.

His plan worked perfectly, the dragon apparently being unable to avoid his webs while roaring in pain (Peter felt bad). In ten minutes Smaug’s cousin was glued to the spot. Literally.

After the job well done, Spider-Man’s web-shooters clicked audibly when he tried to release a web to get out of the ground where reporters would surely come soon.

“Gotta refill, gotta refill…” he muttered.

Suddenly his spider-sense stabbed his neck and Peter realized to look behind him just as a giant red snake –a tail– smacked him into the side of a building, debris falling over his limp, small form. Thoughts a mess, head hurting, _god it hurt_ , he distinguished Tony’s panicked calls for his name from the ringing in his ears.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's hard to write a smart character when you're dumb.
> 
> If I keep repeating some mistake, feel free to tell me!

**Author's Note:**

> Uh-


End file.
